Have you ever wondered why planners in your town make the decisions they do? What factors increase or decrease your city’s resilience to tropical weather? Now you have the opportunity to be a virtual planner through a new video game developed by the Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium.
Being a town planner isn’t easy. Planners try to balance what is best for individuals with what is best for the environment and town overall. Coastal planners have added layers, being tasked with ensuring measures are in place so the town is the most resilient it can be during and after hurricanes. A new serious game called Plan for It! puts the player in the role of the planner of a small coastal community, asking them to make real life resilience decisions in risk/reward scenarios to better prepare their town for the upcoming storm season. Gameplay involves fictional scenarios and decision points that mimic those encountered in a real-life community.
After playing the short game, players have a better understanding of the role of resilience measures and the trade-offs in the planning process. Plan for It! is appropriate for players as young as 6th grade but holds the interest of older children and adults as well. Being a standalone computer-based game, Internet access is not necessary once the files are downloaded, so it can be utilized in any outreach or education setting. It can be used for many educational scenarios.
You can get the Plan for It! app at https://www.microsoft.com/store/apps/9MZWFLXZ310L. Development of Plan for It! was made possible by the Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium and Alabama Cooperative Extension System, with programming provided by Blue Urchin, LLC.
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